Dinosaurs

Anzu Bird-like dinosaur - Chicken from Hell

The fossilized remains of a bizarre bird-like dinosaur, nicknamed the "Chicken from Hell", have recently been unearthed in the US. The 66-million-year-old feathered beast would have resembled a beefed-up emu with a long neck, a meter-long tail like a lizard, and a tall crest on the beaky head.

At the end of its forelimbs were long, sharp claw. The creature stood 1.5 high at the hip, was three meters long, and weighed 300 kg.

Researchers dug the remains from mudstone in the Hell Creek formation in North and South Dakota where fossil hunters have previously excavated bones of Tyrannosaurus rex. The animal, officially named Anzu Wyliei, belongs to a group of dinosaurs mostly known from fossils found in Asia, so this discovery provides the first detailed picture of the genus on the American soil.

For almost a hundred years, the details of these dinosaurs have remained a mystery, but now the fossil evidence has finally shown what it looked like. Anzu was an omnivore, eating vegetation, small animals and their eggs, but it had the build of a fast runner and with long sharp claws was well equipped to fight.